5 Most Common Compact Tractor Attachments

I'm here today do a quick explanation for you today of the top five implements that are typically sold with the compact tractor. Tractors themselves are after all tool carriers and most or every tractor is sold with at least two or more implements. We're going to show you some of the most common ones that are typically sold with new machines.

Far and away the most popular attachment that's sold with the compact tractor is a loader. For us, around 90% of the machines that we've sell go out with one of these things hanging off the front. More and more we're also selling our loaders with skid steer couplers on the front making it even more versatile attachment where you can remove your bucket and put on pound forks or snow plows and those kinds of things onto the end of the loader. Anybody that owns one of these things will tell you that once you have it on your property you will find all kinds of things to do with it that you've never thought of before. Loaders are typically used for in a moving dirt material, snow and those kinds of things but it's also just having a better wheelbarrow around your property. You'll find all kinds of things that you can lift and move and manipulate with a loader. Like I said, most of the time for us it's around 90 % of our machines are going to go out with that loader attached to them. By far that's the most popular attachment that we sell.

The second most popular implement that we sell is by far a finished mower. Most of the time, our most tractors we're selling with mount mowers. These are all 60-inch models that are going to go on the bottom of a convertible B or BX model and typically we sell the mid mount because it's a little bit easier to use. When you're sitting in the seat of your tractor you can easily look down and see the sides of your deck making it easier to trim up against things than a finish mower on the back of the tractor.

Either way, there's a way to get your finished mowing done. Larger machines typically finish mowers on the back and are little bit more economical but finish mowing is a really popular application for your tractor. It gives you a way to maintain the lawns around your home and buildings and those kinds of things.

Rotary cutters are going to be our third most popular implement. Rotary cutters are going to be mowers much like the finished mower was but really geared towards much more rugged applications. If you have a field or a pasture to mow or trails to maintain or woods to clear, a rotary cutter is going to give you much heavier blades and heavier construction that's made to crash through those heavier more demanding conditions. It will not give you a smooth of a finished cut, it's what a finished mower does, really made just to knock things down and kick them out the back but a really, really useful attachment for maintaining your property.

If you compare the blade on a rotary cutter versus the blade on a finished mower you can clearly see the difference of them. They're both called mowers but the application couldn't be more different. On the underside of the machine here this dish is called a stump jumper. If you come up and you hit a rock or stump or something, this curved piece right here is made to ride up and over top of that obstruction where a finish mower is going to have a much more exposed spindle on the bottom side down here.

You can also notice the back of these blades, rotary cutter blades are much, much heavier. Typically able to chew up things from two inches to three inches around depending on the model and these heavy cast blades have a lot more mass and a lot more inertia as they're spinning now, not spinning nearly as fast which is part of the reason you're not going to get the kind of cut that you get from a finished mower but a blade like this is able to cut and chew up things that would really break and damage a finished mower over time.

We see a lot of customers taking mowers and trying to do things with them that they shouldn't. Just keep in mind the applications for these things that are made for and the significant difference is in their construction. Running these things and in situations that are not made for is either going to give you poor quality cuts or really shorten the life of the implement. As we get further down the list here we're going see more regional differences in some of these implements. For us here we have a lot of people who are gardening or having food plots for animals and those kinds of things and so, therefore, we sell a lot of rototillers.

Within the tillers, there's two different types of forward tine and a reverse tine. Typically the reverse tine is better for somebody looking for a really nice finish at the end and doesn't have very rocky soil. The reverse tine tiller will pull itself down and finish your seedbed a lot more nicely but if you're going into really rocky conditions or a virgin soil that hasn't been turned before, a forward tine tiller is going to perform a little bit better for you. If you're a food plot guy for instance and you're going to turn some soil out and the woods somewhere to plant some stuff down for your deer, a forward tine tiller is probably the right choice for you. If you're a dedicated gardener reverse tine is probably going to do a better job.

For us here in the Northeast we sell a lot of snowblowers with our tractors now to go out and clear some of the significant snows that we get off of our driveways and stuff in the wintertime. You typically want to know that snowblowers when they start to get to this size, don't work really well on light snows. If you get the two or three inches snowfall you really have to get enough snow buildup in front of the snowblower and pulled back into the impeller before it's going to properly start to clear it off of your driveway.

Oftentimes we like to see when somebody is buying a snow blower it's also paired with a front lake or a front loader or another attachment to take care of some of those light snow falls as well where these things are really great and very efficient for the times that we really get hit in the snowed under. Buying a compact tractor is exciting for a lot of different reasons. For that initial purchase to get your mowing and loader work done and those kinds of things but you're quickly going to find as you come into additional tasks around your home or properties that there's going to be an attachment to do just about every job that you can come up with. If you're in the need for any attachments for your equipment, we have a lot of them listed online on our website and we're glad to help you over the phone too. You can check us out at www.messicks.com or call us at 800-222-3373